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Do you use Blogger for your website, and perhaps Adsense too. Then do read to be aware of the risks of dealing with Google.

It was a dark dark night about a year ago. A friend and I were sat at home, alone, with the wind howling outside. When suddenly an eerie scream came to us on the wind and a second later a ghostly face appeared at the window….Actually no, it was nothing like that. But it turned into a Google Horror Story for us both.

My friend is an exceptional events manager. She is the most creative person I have EVER met, can turn junk into diamonds, can turn a bare room into a palace with what you have in the cupboard under the stairs. She is amazing. And she loves organizing and decorating for kids parties – her themed kids parties are the most amazing I have ever seen and would blow away all of the other party sites out there. But she is busy, very busy, and so an idea was born. Let’s go into partnership and set up a website. She can be the creative one, and I’ll be her clutsy friend who can’t do anything crafty and tries out her ideas and tutorials. I’ll run the site and do all the stuff in the background while she creates these wonderful tutorials, crafts, parties and printables.

So we decided on a name – Cool Parties – and we set up a free site with Blogger. She and I worked solidly every spare minute we had in the evenings and weekends and got this site looking beautiful and crammed with great starting content and pages. We signed up with Adsense and added a few adverts, and tested the water with a Facebook page and a free printable to start with. We had an Etsy shop ready to sell Martinne’s amazing party printables. And with no promotion people started to find us and like us and we started to get traffic before we were even ready. After about 12 weeks we were almost ready to properly launch – then I woke up one morning to see an email from Adsense to tell me that our account with them had been terminated due to us fraudulently clicking on our own adverts, and they were keeping our earnings too.

What? We had NEVER clicked our own adverts – we knew better than that. There must be a mistake and a way to appeal or contact them. Well have you ever tried to contact Google? You can forget it. All of their emails are sent from ‘no-reply’ email addresses and just bounce back. There is no way to call them, there is no customer service, there is no contact us form. Nothing. We were really annoyed – how can they do this with no way to contact them, no details about how and why they think we have been defrauding them! It’s like being convicted of a crime and punished without being able to defend yourself.

But 2 days later it got worse. I awoke to an email from Google again – this time to tell us that they had shut down our Blogger website for spamming. What? Spamming? We had never ever even sent a single email to anyone! We had a mailing list that people were starting to join, but we hadn’t yet sent out any emails at all, to anyone, ever. So how on earth can they shut down our entire website for spamming? Again, there was no way to reply, although there was a way to resubmit the website for consideration – which we did and never got it reinstated. EVERYTHING was gone with no way to access it. All of our posts, gone. All of our hours spent on design and set up – gone. It was all gone, we had nothing left. Months of hard work – gone.

Photo credit – American Horror Story

We tried again for a while, but it was so disheartening that we didn’t have the energy and enthusiasm for it the second time around. Martinne was really upset and decided after a while not to continue and so our brilliant idea just faded away. The domain name is up for renewal very shortly, so take a look over at Cool Parties while it is still there for just a short time – although it is looking pretty unloved now with expired photos etc. It was a great idea, killed by Google.

The moral of this Google Horror Story. Beware – if your site is on Blogger, you do not own this site, and at any time Google can take it away for good and everything on it will be gone.

So if you are fairly new to blogging, and are serious about your site and it’s content, and plan to be around for a while – do consider self-hosting and moving everything over now while you are still small. Then you own the domain name, your content is your own and you can use your space how you like without anyone telling you – nah, we don’t like that.

Even if you have an established blog, do consider moving to a self-hosted site for your own security. It’s really not that expensive. Signing up for a year for a single site including a domain name for free – will probably cost you in the region of $2.99 to $4 a month. You can always redirect traffic to your new site automatically. Think about the horrifying alternative!

IMPORTANT UPDATE – since I published this post today, guess what! I had a message from Google to tell me that they have disabled my ADsense account for both this site and my sewing site because they have detected ‘invalid activity’. I can no longer log in, can no longer show my adverts and they will NOT be paying me my account balance of $250 outstanding. That’s chapter Two in my Google Horror Story. Sometimes its very difficult to be the little guy when the big guy has all the options, all the know-how and all the power.

73 Comments

Andi C.
April 12, 2013 @
8:24 pm

Oh my gosh how horrible!! Do you think it has something to do with being in the Caribbean?? Perhaps your site(s) have been hacked into? Not fair!! Is there anything I can do as a follower – wish I knew more about how all of these things work so I could give you some advice that would help you. Sharing on FB in hopes that a blogger will be able to help. Hang in there!

Hi Andi – no my websites have not been hacked, everything is safe. But there seems to be a current problem of invalid or malicious clicking of peoples adverts, lots of times by the same person – all automated and undetectable. I am also asking around to see if I can find anyone who knows how to protect against this so I can advise other bloggers. Too late for me – I was targeted and am now banned for life. I hope I can learn more to stop this happening to others.

My tenacious teenage son had a problem with google and he called them over and over and over and over again. They finally relented.
If they open a dispute for you, don’t call back to open another one because it will reset the first dispute.
There is a number to call, my son googled it. One of them is (650) 253-0000 (650)253-0001 –fax
I hope this helps!

Oh, how well I know this story! I have been through this horrible situation 1 year ago but was lucky enough to get it all back, of course, with no explanations or apologies. And I am absolutely convince it was because my blog was initially based in Romania, a teeny, tiny country, too small for the all mighty Google.
I am now saving all my work on WordPress, as a back up.

Deb, I noticed your site isn’t at blogspot.com, so is it just Adsense that is giving you grief now? They can’t lock the content of THIS site can they since it’s not hosted by a Google product like blogger?

I’ve read your articles for some time now and enjoy them, but sickened to hear that this happened to you and others.[email protected]
(spotted you at It’s Overflowing linky party today)

Yes my website is safe because I have a self-hosted site. So yes, it’s just Adsense that has been disabled. Thank goodness I learned my lesson from the first time this happened – otherwise my websites would be no doubt disabled too. Anyone using Blogger – especially if you have Adsense too – beware.

Honestly, reading this just gave me heart palpitations! 🙂 I have been blogging for over 3 years and if I woke up and it was all gone I would freak out! I just backed up my blog (I mean like just now) and I am looking for a self host! So sorry to hear about your troubles but I am truly thankful for your advice!

I am working on an article for this right now. I’m co-ordinating with a Blogger user who is thinking of switching to WordPress, and she can give us her real life example of what she did, and how it worked, where the difficulties were, what were the costs, how to import existing content into the new blog etc. It’s really important to not leave yourself at risk of losing all your hard work and followers if the worst was to happen.

Yikes, Deby! I’m so sorry to read about this story. Clearly, Google is not the genius company they are made out to be. (Or they’re made up of flawed humans like us.) I recently migrated from WordPress.com to self-hosted WordPress and had a few horrors of my own (losing all of my subscribers at one point; having my pins from my old blog labeled as spam by Pinterest)…but not to this extreme! This story is an important one to share simply to educate people that Google owns your content on Blogger (not sure everyone knows that), so thanks for taking the time to articulate it…and I hope things are on the up and up for you now!

I read this article with interest. I was also accused of clicking on my own ads. Only I had barely applied for adsense & the ads had not even begun on my blog yet!! I just gave it up & I look for other ways to earn money. {I am getting rich . . . NOT!} *Wink*

Thank you so much for the motivation. I purchased my domain a while back and redirected my blogspot.com to just my dot.com. I don’t have adsense because like you said, there is no help with google. My old application for the blogspot was disapproved obviously because I didn’t use that. Now I can’t change it to my current site because I signed up once and apparently you can’t change the url.. Mind numbing. I’ll be looking forward to following this series!
Thanks,
Kate

I had a ‘we’ve disabled you account’ email from AdSense last week, seriously disappointing since I haven’t done anything wrong. I’m wanting to appeal their decision, but I’m not sure that explaining that I haven’t done anything will be enough to get things reversed. Thankfully we moved to WordPress last year, so our blog is safe. I’m sorry to hear that you lost everything you had worked so hard on!

It’s frustrating isn’t it Becca. Did they give you a ‘reason’ ? It seems that unless you have some real proof that your particular account has been personally targeted by someone then an appeal is impossible. I’m still trying to get to the bottom of all of these disabled accounts and hope to be able to put some advice on the site if I ever get a clear answer.

When I started blogging, I kept hearing about how your stuff ain’t really your and how bad Google was so I moved my site quickly. For those looking to make the switch, switching is really easy. Do a search on moving from blogger to WordPress.org and they will walk you thru it.

The key to remember here is that self-hosting with a wordpress engine is different from hosting at wordpress.org. If you set up at wordpress.org, you are still putting your site in someone else’s hands.

Deby, hopefully this goes out as a huge lesson to anyone running a blog using a “service”. It is inexpensive and easy to self-host and you own your material and your platform. Blogger, wordpress.com (different from using wordpress on your own host), tumblr, etc etc always leave you vulnerable to changing rules and arbitrary decisions. There are lots of people out there to reach out to for help getting set up, myself included.

Wow! I am going to look into self hosting. Your hands are just tied when they do something like this and all that work…..it makes me ill just thinking about it. Thank you so much for giving us a heads up. God bless!

Wow. Scary. I have been writing my blog since 2006 and it’s my only scrapbook. I had no idea they could just TAKE my stuff away. Oh, and I have adsense too, but have never gotten paid anything… wonder how that works.

I wish we could gather enough evidence to file a class action suit against Adsense. You would not believe the number of bloggers I have heard from who have been in your exact situation, myself included. I find it interesting that these sites are usually shut down just before Adsense is about to pay out. My 80 yo grandmother was clicking the ads on my site. That was enough to flag my site and all my earnings disappeared. Apparently speaking out will get you shut down, too.

I signed up for Adsense when I first started blogging and got denied based on my content! I paint furniture for goodness sake! Now I am so glad they denied me because I don’t have to worry about them shutting me down for no reason.

Oh, wow. I haven’t had problems with them yet and have been using them for several years now. I did just do a back up though because I am switching everything to indiemade.com (hopefully there are no problems there!!). Maybe I haven’t had problems because I live close enough to go pound on some office doors at google hq, lol!

I hate being on Google! I wish I had never started with them. Their picture posting process is ridiculous, I can’t find anything on their ‘help’ page…guess what? I have to Google all my questions! Their website set up is so basic, yet confusing…especially when you’re new to everything, and I can’t even get them to accept me to Adsense! They keep saying I’m not what they are looking for or I’m in violation of terms of use…but don give a sister a reason why or anything. Geez!! I’m so sorry what happened to you! I am going to be changing my site, but I thought I couldn’t take my blog name with me?
Jodi
Second Wind of Texas

Sorry to tell you bad news Jodi, but you only bought an address for your blog which redirects people to your blogger account. So Google still host it and ‘own’ it. Therefore they can decide not to at any time.

The blog Anglotopia.net has a horror story, too, about how their domains were stolen. I guess there are lots of risks out there. So sorry you had this problem. I think I need to find a new search engine.

I’m so sorry to hear this! I moved off of Blogger to WP just last year, and it does give you more control. It’s a good reminder not to count too much on anything you don’t “own,” like Facebook. It could disappear tomorrow, or suddenly start charging. So just use AdSense, Facebook, Twitter, etc. as tools and make sure your blog is your main focus.

Hi Deby. Consider looking at others beyond Google to find your bad guys. I looked into it a bit, and I think your site was hacked, and someone else acted as if they were you, and did all those nasty things that Google accused you off. // To protect yourself against hacking, you need to do more than merely hosting with a low cost self-hosting company, like goDaddy. In fact, they are not the cheapest option for hacked sites. They charge $150/hr to restore your site, which is quite a lot. There are other hosting companies who don’t charge for this however… If you want more info, email me, okay. There are issues with too simple passwords, you must install backup software and do so regularly. you need to get virus/malware protection on your computer. Etc.

Thank you for your comments, however I am 100% sure that my site has not been hacked. There is no problem with the security of my site or my hosting provider GoDaddy. I also have a complex password and plenty of virus protection and security on my PC too as well as my server. The only recorded logins are my own. But these things cannot protect you against this kind of attack. The problem with Adsense comes from outside of the website. I am sure you know that with right click and inspect element, anyone can see and copy the coding for your website, your layout, images, and advert coding. Then they can simply use that code to make it look as though the excessive clicking is coming from your website because the advert coding is personal to you. A website owner is usually unaware of it because the visit happens only once so does not draw suspicion for excessive traffic. And the clicking does not happen on your website so it does not show up in any of your own tracking, logs files and statistics and no IP addresses are logged. The first you know about it is when Adsense disables your account for invalid activity – which they can detect but don’t tell you about. As a website owner you are totally unable to track this and powerless to prevent it happening. May I refer you to this thread on the Adsense forum – you can see how expert users describe the problem and show how once it happens there is nothing you can do except lose your account because Google doesn’t help out with blocking the ip addresses of these offenders. https://groups.google.com/a/googleproductforums.com/d/msg/adsense/-/OM0CZOpCne4J This makes it clear that even if you remove the adverts from your website, it can still look as though they are being clicked over and over by someone.
Sorry for the long reply, I just wanted readers to know that this issue is nothing to do with a website being hacked or having a lack of security. And the main idea of the warning was for those with blogs hosted by Blogger to realise that the content and blog is not your own, and can be removed by Google at any time. They may even delete your blog for spamming when you have never sent a single email.

I’m so sorry about what happened to you. There is software (called Site Sucker or something like that) that might be able to pull out your info so you could re-use it elsewhere if you ever want to. You would need to use it right away before the site is taken down. Hope you have much better luck with whatever you decide to do in the future.

Hey Deby,
Despite the horror of this completely terrible event, thank you for posting your saga. I am always amazed (out here in my bubble of protection, apparently) that there are those who would choose to destroy something someone else worked so hard on. I cannot figure out what someone’s motive might be – which is just sad, because it happens a lot. And it’s especiallydisheartening when there is no recourse — I am of the opinion that a company like Google should be doing everything they can to support their bloggers instead of obliterating them without a chance of appeal or recourse. Thank you (again) for allowing newbie bloggers like me to get a clear picture of what is out there and what we must do to protect our content and ourselves.

Wow awful! I just read a similar thing on the blog neonfresh.com which was nicegirlnotes.com until just a couple weeks ago! She investigated and found out some hackers had embedded HTML onto her site. So scary.

This post made me angry and wanting to cry for you at the same time. I self-host with wordpress, so they can’t take my blog away…but I also got my adsense disabled and earnings taken away. The sad part was it wasn’t for invalid click activity, they said they are “unable” to give me the reason. SEEMS SO WRONG! Especially to not ever pay up. I don’t know how they get away with it….with any other company…if you agree to advertise for them…they pay for the period of time that you advertised for them…PERIOD. grr…don’t even get me started on this. I didn’t even go through the peition process with them because I hear this happens to way too many people and I want nothing to do with them now.

I keep going back and forth about switching from blogger. I host my heirloom seed site through fatcow and they are amazing! Supposedly they also have a blog option to just transfer over from blogger to wordpress and just add it to my blog. After reading this I’m a bit more motivated!!!

I’m so sorry to hear you went through this. It really is terrible! I know you probably did this, but it’s always a good reminder to tell friends and family members not to click on your ads. The internet is just like the “Wild-Wild West”. Be careful out there, everyone! 🙁

I am sorry to hear about your horror story. 🙁 I have moved to WordPress a few months ago to own my blog. The most important thing being on blogspot is to keep backing up your blog, just in case something bad happens. Internet is so crazy, something comes up all the time. But this is beyond everything, very sad! Hope with time you get over it…

What a horrible experience but an amazing post! Thank you so much for sharing this! I’m going to give serious thought to switching to WordPress. Thank you for all the details and thanks so much for linking this up to Give Me The Goods Monday! Hope to see you again this Monday!
Jamie @ somuchbetterwithage.com

Hi! Stopping by from Seven Alive blog hop. Already following via FB, now through G+ as well. Wow!! I have heard of this happening and because of that was thinking of switching to WordPress, but this post has definitely made up my mind. I am a newer blogger who has worked really hard the past few months on growing my blog, dedicated hours a day to it, and to think they can just delete it that easily is disheartening! I have adscense and although I have never clicked on an ad thank goodness I could see that it could accidentally happen easily and that worries me. Goodbye Blogger!! Thanks so much for sharing this story and so sorry what happened to you and your friend.

I was blog hopping and found your site. And yes I am part of these “google horror story”. Two of my blogs which I have it for more than five years are gone! Yes gone! I found it while I was vacationing in another country. When I get back here in the US I tried hard but I got lost interest and decided to make another two blogs with blogger/google. My two blogs are in there own domain by “godaddy”. I pay one year to the two blogs for $10.00 each but still they let it gone. Now everytime I check the url it is up for sale!! What the heck? I am not a tech savvy and do not know what is going on but it made me feel frustrated. Hate thinking of it.

That does sound very strange that you paid for a domain name but then it disappeared and your blogs with it. You normally need to pay for a hosting account too – a domain name is only like a postal address but the hosting is like the home on the address and is where your files are stored. If your blogs disappeared its more likely a problem with the hosting, not the name – if it was blogger then perhaps your sites were removed or disabled by Google. If you feel you paid for something that you didn’t get then you should call GoDaddy about it. I use them myself and have had cause to call them a couple of times about my own sites – they offer 24hr phone support and are super helpful and you don’t have to wait ages on the line.

I can relate to your horror story. My blog had only been up and running for two months when it got disabled by Adsense. I have appealed 3x and each time been denied. I still to this day cannot figure out why they banned me. I was just getting started too. Such a bummer.

Hi Deby,
I just came across this article clicking through one of your newsletter links. As an introvert, it took me a long time to talk myself into blogging and putting myself ‘out there’. Initially, it went well, I mean really well. I had followers who shared their thoughts and opinions respectfully, creating a warm friendly place to be ‘me’ online. Then it was gone; complete with Adsense nonsense & lockups. No warning, no reasons, no recourse… three years of hard work…just gone. After a year and a half – I gave up dealing with Google over the issue.
At that point, I did attempt to resurrect The Wreak Peace Project on WordPress.org. It was too much to reconstruct after the Blogger fiasco. I’m a drag & drop kinda gal. I have allowed my godaddy domain name to expire… maybe someday I’ll stir up the gumption to give it another go. For now, the effort still outweighs the benefits.
Thank you so much for sharing your story and helping other Bloggers become aware of the dangers & pitfalls of staying with google. I wish I had found you sooner! All the best on your new ventures!!

So sorry to hear about what happened to you. I am sure many Blogger users are still unaware of how they can wake up one morning and find the whole lot just gone – for good. And often for no reason at all that you will ever be able to find out or understand. I wish you blogging luck for the future.

Hi, thank you for this very useful post. I come to your article nearly a year later, and it appears you’re able to use adsense again. If you were able to get un-banned from adsense can you please share how?
Thanks!

I was one of a very lucky few Ted. I was able to demonstrate from my records that I was aware of the click-bombing problem quickly and I showed how I had responded to it to protect the advertisers, and what safeguards I had put in place to try to stop it happening again (as far as possible.) Because I understood my responsibilities and had acted correctly to protect the advertisers, I was reinstated. That doesn’t mean that’s the end of the Adsense problems, but that’s a discussion for another day!